The Warner sun. (Warner, Brown Co., Dakota [S.D.]) 1885-1???, 1887-09-23
THE PUBLIC N
How They May BE AcQuired-Home Making
Rendered -Easy-Rontine Experience Of =4
the Settler.

Free land has bsen, and is, a stalwart
agencyin the settlement and civilization of
the so-called West. How much greater, or
less, than other influences / cannot say. A
friend and a beneficiary of our public land
system may overestimate its influences upon
himself and his community, but it will be q
pardonable exaggeratioe. The peaceful
ease and rapidity with which a new terri
tory or prescribed area of our pub
lie dom ain is brought under the
pillow. is remarkable. Favorable gov
eminent, climate and soil are undoubt-
eddy inducements, but the price of the farm
is the determining consideration. The local
government may not be perfect, the climate
supernal and the soil ~inexhaustible, but the
land is free. There is the boon. The people
of the ~aeffete" East may be skeptical as to
the climate and soil of Dakota, for instance,
but they have no doubt as to the cost of I60
acres of her prairie. The possession Of vast
areas of unoccupied land has been supple
mented by a wiser dispossession. The hnpn-
cial necessities of the Rebellion taught our
statesmen that wild land was useless as a
source of reyenue. Thereafter the reserva-
ton of the public domain for the actual set
tier became tho fixed policy Of the govern
HUH 1u6 CDhb " ddlCs PASfs OOO9N ~
excess of the receipts therefrom. the
wisest investment any nation ever made.
CENTER OF ~NTEREsT
Hence it is that the local United States
land office is the center of interest in a new
country. 1t is there the pioneer meets the
agents of the government and secures his
free land To this Office he submits his
troubles and grievances and through 1T OBJ
tains all possible relief If intelligently and
honestly administered the settler has little
trouble in perfecting his claim and acquir-
ing a patent from the United States signed
by the president The method Of making a
selection, entry and proof of residence and
Improvement is SO simple that the most
ignorant stranger succeeds in his undertak-
ing and establishes a title to his quarter
section as good as the nation can give. IL
he makes a mistake the government is al
ways ready to correct it for him as long as
the difficulty is between himself and
the government. A settler may make
application for one tract and establish his
home upon another. When The error in the
record is discovered, he can get il corrected
by submitting duly corroborated evidence OF
his settlement upon the land he in
tended to enter. The entry-man also finds
that his homestead is free from debts con-
tracted before the patent issues and, more
over, is free from taxation for seven years
if he elects to live out the free period pre-
scribed by law before he is required TO ten
der his proof of inhabitancy end cultivation.
NOT only is the land donated to the home
steader, but it is exempted for all time from
the legal consequences of former troubles,
honest or dishonest If he loses it by in
curing new calamities the blame is his. The
result of this dual benefit is manifest
Loyalty, thrift, and temperance are the
characteristics of the community and com
monwealth founded upon this rock
THE RECTANGULAR SYSTEM
of surveys, reported to congress in 1884, by
Thomas Jefferson, is simplicity itself IL
find the boundaries of a piece OF land easily
after it has been given to you, is the mex
best thing to the gift itself. This is a dia.
gram of a tract Of land con Salt Lick creel
emptying into the Ohio river in Virginia,
under the irregular system" as it is in The
Atlantic states. This illustration simply
shows the marking on the ground, and i
not one of the truly irregular:
Dogwood GAO perches. White oak